Precincts In County Crucial Tiny Palm Springs An Election Barometer

Come Tuesday, the political eyes and ears of the nation will tune in to Florida, with pollsters and prognosticators scrambling to predict the winner of the presidential preference elections.

Some will come to Palm Beach County, their sights set on key precincts that a computer has spit out as being yet one more piece of a puzzle that, when linked, will predict which candidate will carry the election.

And while there is a lot of sophisticated hardware and software that will crunch, munch and bunch the data, some say finding out who will be the Republican and Democratic nominees is as easy as taking a trip to the village of Palm Springs.

That`s right, tiny Palm Springs, a town that one town leader says really is little more than a midwestern community plopped in the middle of South Florida. ``Its a family-oriented town,`` said Town Council Member Charles Helm. ``It has a mix of single-family homes.``

And that, officials say, may help make Palm Springs one of the best barometers of political winds in Palm Beach County.

Helms says that his precinct, 113, has been touted as one of the most accurate since he moved into town 18 years ago.

And the reputation is backed up by some strong data.

In the last three presidential preference primaries, the town of Palm Springs has been correct in selecting candidates, both Republicans and Democrats, in all but one case. In 1984, Gary Hart was the favorite of Palm Springs, although Walter Mondale won the nomination.

Still, the town that has no main street, no business district and no distiguishing characteristics other than it leads the county in divorces, is good at choosing winners.

It is a town with working-class people of varied ages and homes with yards that the neighborhood kids flock to.

``It looks like a Leave It to Beaver kind of community to me,`` said resident Geoffrey Kashdan. It is the kind of community where you might find the elusive silent majority that puts politicians in the White House.

``It`s more reflective of the entire country than the rest of the county,`` Helm said.

According to the 1990 census, Palm Springs has fewer than 10,000 residents, with no particular age group being dominant.

The average home costs about $73,000, and the average rent is $494 a month.

Rentals make up about 33 percent of the households, and only about 7 percent of the residents are seasonal.

Politically, 40 percent of the registered voters are Republicans, 52 percent are Democrats, and 8 percent are independents.

The largest group of voters is age 30 to 55.

But Helm sees the town changing. He sees some of the older residents moving out and some newer people coming in.

``Some parts of the community have really changed,`` he said, and with the changes has come some apathy.

There are 400 fewer registered voters in town now than there were 10 years ago, he said.

And that, he says, could signal the end of the town`s prognostication power and turning the predicting back to the computers.